SOOTHE THE SENSES

 

​Dr. Jessica Nutik Zitter is an advocate of the dying, instilling hope at the end of life. She practices gratitude as a means to connect, in a very special way, with the dying patient and the patient's family, and explains it in the blog post we've shared this month, which was an article she wrote as a contributor to The Washington Post. Below, we've also included a short clip of her talk from the Global Gratitude Summit, "Bringing Hope Back into Life Even as it Approaches the End."

AN INTENSIVE CARE DOCTOR ADVISES HOW TO SOOTHE THE SENSES OF A DYING LOVED ONE - by Dr. Jessica Nutik Zitter.
I once walked into the room of a dying patient to hear a game show blaring on television. The sound of the buzzer, slapped down by eager contestants, was jarring in this room from which a soul would soon depart. This program probably had been left on by someone — a nurse, a family member, one of the cleaning people — who had turned it on while in the room, focusing on some task and forgetting the patient in the bed. And now, although the room was empty of people, it was filled with a cacophony that jarred me, and, I presume, the dying patient in the bed.
As an ICU and palliative care physician, I am a frequent witness to death. And I am often struck by the broad range of experiences for dying patients. CLICK HERE to read the rest of the post and visit Dr. Zitter's website.